Several organizations of victims of the Nazi regime as well as newspapers protested against the failure of police to intervene against an unlawful demonstration of the neo-Nazi group, skin-heads, in Hannover last weekend. During the demonstration, the 200 rightwing extremists carried banners calling for the expulsion of Jews and foreigners, and displayed Nazi symbols, which are banned in this country.
A spokesman for the Interior Ministry of Lower Saxony, Gerhard Roemheld, said in a press conference in Hannover that police were ordered not to move in “in order not to give the neo-Nazis the pleasure of being given yet more political weight.”
He admitted that the demonstration definitely involved several offences, such as carrying unlawful signs and calling for racial discrimination. But Roemheld added that the authorities took into consideration the motives of the extremists, which were to provoke both the police and the public.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.